Ukrainian defense minister says ‘optimistic’ forecast sees war over by end of the year

• Ukraine’s Defense Minister says he expects the conflict in Ukraine to end by the end of 2014.
• Oleksii Reznikov was speaking at the GLOBSEC-2022 forum in Bratislava, Slovakia.
• Ukrainian defense forces still need heavy weapons, primarily MLRS, and other artillery, tanks, and anti-ship systems.

Oleksii Reznikov, the Ukrainian Defense Minister, said it is “hard to predict when the war will end, but my optimistic projection is that it may end by the end of the year.”

Reznikov was speaking at the GLOBSEC-2022 forum in Bratislava in Slovakia.

He said Ukrainian defense forces still “need heavy weapons, primarily MLRS, as well as other artillery, tanks, anti-ship systems, unmanned systems, missiles, and air defenses.”

“We need them quickly and in quantities commensurate with the scale of the threats. Ukraine found itself in a state of war without adequate support from the democratic world,” he said.

“The situation is changing now, but slowly. We appreciate the contribution of each country which is currently with Ukraine, which has committed itself to increase the effectiveness of international support,” Reznikov said.

He added: “Ukraine has changed its philosophy in the supply of weapons. If in the first month of the war we focused on obtaining anti-tank and anti-aircraft portable systems, now the nature of the war has changed and we need more heavy weapons.”

“In the Kherson region, the Russian army is building a deeply echeloned defense. Our goal is to prevent Russian scenarios from being realized and to liberate our territories as soon as possible,” he said.

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